


Upper Hand

by NekoAisu



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern: No Powers, Alternate universe - Mafia, Implied Sexual Content, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Off-Screen Murder, Organized Crime, Secret Identity, Suits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-02-02
Packaged: 2019-10-21 06:24:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17637473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NekoAisu/pseuds/NekoAisu
Summary: Prompto Argentum is not a murderer. Truly. In the eyes of the law, he’s just another well-behaved citizen of Insomnia’s west district. The suits in his closet (pressed and perfectly maintained Armani) are for work─his office job at Fleuret Pharmaceuticals─same as the gun he keeps under his pillow.According to Noctis, his favorite police officer, he’s a menace in dress shoes for all the wrong (lawful) reasons.





	Upper Hand

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sh1k4r1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sh1k4r1/gifts).



> for Sh1k4r1 as a super late exchange gift! 
> 
> warnings for: off-screen mentions of death/gun violence & all that other mafia/crime-related stuff

While Insomnia is a metropolis of intimately confusing proportions, it has a surprisingly robust police force. Prompto watches a row of patrol vehicles sweep down his street, lights and sirens on, and sighs. He pushes away from the window and stretches, joints popping and settling into place. When he yawns, it stretches the line of scar tissue along the curve of his cheek. His jaw pops and he curses, shuffling over to his closet like there isn’t still a load of bloodied clothing sitting on top of his washer. He sighs at the sight of black on black on  _ black.  _

“Another day at the office,” he sighs, picking the simple number he usually dons for his day job. It wouldn’t do to arouse suspicion for dressing as he wants to the day after a major enemy has been disposed of. 

_ Good fuckin’ riddance, Glauca.  _

Prompto Argentum is not a murderer. Truly. In the eyes of the law, he’s just another well-behaved citizen of Insomnia’s west district. The suits in his closet (pressed and perfectly maintained Armani far above his pay-grade) are for work─his office job at Fleuret Pharmaceuticals─same as the gun he keeps under his pillow. He’s a model citizen and a very eligible bachelor just like all other single, twenty-something-year-olds. 

According to Noctis Lucis Caelum, the most gullible thorn in Prompto’s side to ever exist, he’s a menace in dress shoes for all the wrong reasons. Prompto very much returns the sentiment in kind. He’s not blind. If anything, his aesthetic eye is continually drawn to how Noctis’s body cuts a fine silhouette in uniform. It’s  _ distracting _ and that alone is problem enough. 

Prompto works for Fleuret, yes, but the files tucked carefully in between memorabilia from his childhood are evidence enough that it’s not near the only job he has. There are contracts, NDAs and small stacks of cash set in worn envelopes to match, with each and every one made out to Besithia Argentum. 

He’d changed the contract name the moment he’d buried a bullet in that quack’s brain. He never intends on going back to being Quicksilver. No way in Ifrit’s fiery hell.

He’s Prompto, now. Plain ol’ Prompto Argentum who in no way is a wanted international criminal.  _ No siree.  _

Noctis doesn’t know about the multiple (highly dangerous) jobs and Prompto would love it to stay that way. While there’s definite allure to knowing he’s flirting with arrest and definite charges for manslaughter, ownership of illegal firearms, and all that other run-of-the-mill underworld stuff, it means far less to him in comparison to staying  _ alive.  _ With as many enemies as he’d made over the years, jail was a death sentence of his own making. 

He scrubs a hand over his chin, feeling the beginnings of stubble against his fingers, and smiles. Thank the Astrals for Fridays. He needs a godsdamn  _ break. _

His phone chimes, the cheery  _ kweh  _ informing him of a new message on his personal cell. He plucks it from among his sheets and swipes the notification to the right, typing in his passcode before the message comes up in full. 

 

**_Noct🐟_ ** _ said at 05:56 a.m. _

morning prom 

**_You_ ** _ said at 05:57 a.m. _

Morning, Noct!!❤️️

**_Noct🐟_ ** _ said at 05:57 a.m. _

another day @ the office and i can already feel my will to live draining away

**_You_ ** _ said at 05:57 a.m. _

You can do it!!! Fight!!!

**_Noct🐟_ ** _ said at 05:58 a.m. _

Gladio’s in chrge of drills today

no thank you i’d rather not die today 

**_You_ ** _ said at 05:58 a.m. _

Aww

I’m sure you’ll be fine!! Seriously

You’re super capable, my dude

It’ll be fine❤️️ 

**_Noct🐟_ ** _ said at 05:59 a.m. _

prom if i had even half the confidence in myself that you have in me

i’m not sure what id do

oh shit

it’s almost 6

bye prom

❤️️

**_You_ ** _ said at 05:59 a.m. _

Take care!! Good luck!!❤️️

 

Prompto huffs a laugh. Noctis is lovely, truly. He’s honest and upstanding on top of being handsome in that rare, regal way some people tend to be. Prompto thanks his stars that he’s so easily fooled. 

Noctis is, by no means, dumb. He’s one of the sharper tacks of Insomnia’s police force and scarily skilled in combat to boot. Prompto worried he’d see right through his disguise when they’d first met, Prompto barely nineteen and taken into the station as a witness to a (minor) raid. Playing the terrified teenager who had managed to be in the worst place at the worst time was all too easy when he thought about how terrified he was of being convicted. Aranea had shown up when he was released, pictures of the station’s layout on his phone same as Noctis’s mobile number. 

He’d gotten a text three days later inviting him out for coffee. It was such an inane thing, but he’d accepted all the same. Now, a good few years later, they’re still talking regularly. It’s helpful that Noctis doesn’t know how much information he drops while chatting. What sucks is how easily he manages to shove himself into Prompto’s own operation like a particularly determined doorstop. Under normal circumstances, Prompto would not have hesitated to put a bullet where a helmet should have been and call in Loqi to clean up the aftermath, but Noct is not at all a “normal circumstance.”

Not when he smiles so bright when they hit the arcade on their days off. Not when he looks off to the side, flushed from cheek to chest at his confession. Not when he gasps and cries out into the dark of his fancy uptown apartment, Prompto’s hands on him only cause for pleasure and never worry.

Aranea had taken one look at Prompto’s carefully neutral expression during his reports and said, “You need to get out of this business, kid,” which is about  _ the most impossible  _ thing he’s attempted yet. Once you’re in the business, no matter the job you’ve got, you don’t leave until you’re six feet under. 

He tried for all of a month before old enemies came knocking on his door and he’d knocked them into the Bay of Kings as thanks for their  _ lovely  _ attempts at house warming. He knows there are no points given for attempts, but he wishes there was a way to wash his hands of all the wild shit he’d entrenched himself in (wishes he could hold Noctis without thinking of how easily he could wrap his fingers around his throat and watch it bruise in his hold). 

Noctis is the one thing he’s afraid to lose. He can always change jobs, move to Altissia and rent an apartment with a view, take his fortune and spend it travelling from one corner of Eos to another. 

But nothing compares to the perfect, sincere smiles Noct gives him in the morning. The sun dims in comparison to his radiance, even when debauched (perhaps even more so, then), and Prompto wants to stay in his light forever. He wants to worship with unstained hands and lips in the way Noctis deserves. 

It only makes sense that he’d get none of what he wants, the barrel of a Beretta digging sharply into his back held by none other than the object of his affections. “Hands where I can see them!”

He lifts them slowly, thin silver band glinting on his left hand glinting fever bright when he comments, “You’re  _ really  _ good at your job, Noct.” The muzzle shifts ever so slightly and Prompto takes the opportunity to turn around, knocking the gun to the side and smiling disarmingly. 

Noctis stares at him with a mixture of fury and absolute devastation that’s all too familiar and he laughs, shoving the hurt aside. He’d made his grave and he’d lie in it without complaint. 

“It’s a shame I’ll have to miss our da─”

“Don’t you  _ dare  _ finish that sentence _.” _

There’s a mouth on his, fierce and unforgiving where it burns away any words Prompto had resting on his tongue, and he surrenders. The handcuffs never come, Noctis shoving him away with a glare harsh enough it sends a chill racing down his spine in response. “Not going to arrest me?”

“Get out of here,” Noctis orders in a whisper. “I don’t want to see you again.”

And he does, takes Aranea’s bike out of the city and doesn’t look back once, ring still on his finger like a promise. It’s only when he’s halfway around Eos and living under a new name that he stops running like a devil is on his tail, tracks covered just enough to be safe while leaving breadcrumbs for the one person he prays will track him down. 

He’s thirty and at peace with his life when there’s a knock at his door same as the one Noctis would tap out on his old apartment. He opens it expecting to meet death, or something near it. 

He gets a vision in black, instead, and the tentative smile of someone left lonely for far too long. Noctis mumbles, bashful even with over half a decade under his belt since last they met, “Hey, Prom.”

The ring on his finger is all too obvious where it shines in the early morning light. He never took it off. 

**Author's Note:**

> kudos, concrit, and comments are all v much appreciated <3
> 
> hmu on:  
> twitter - FlamingAceKiri  
> discord - NekoAisu#7099


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